Category Archives: Languages

My name is Frank, I’m Operations Manager for TenDa Plastics CO., Limited. located in DongGuan City China . I am very glad to see your company web and writing to you to explore the possible cooperation with you .

It means something close to “Want to read something interesting?” This is my wobbly beginner’s Finnish.

Finnish is maybe not the easiest thing for speakers of the Latin group of languages to learn, as you can see by trying to decipher a random front page of the country’s biggest newspaper, the Hensingin Sanomat. Like this one from last week:

Euronews has an article with a nice map of European languages in danger. The map is interactive on the Euronews site, here. Every now and then we hear a story about the rampant death of languages around the world. The news here is that in Europe, at least, languages are largely holding their own. The Euronews article is built around a UNESCO report, which you can view here.

The Republic of Kazakhstan (Қазақстан Республикасы) will become Qazaqstan Respy’bli’kasy. Clear as a bell.

I put up this chart of the new Latinized script last November, in a post called Apostrophe Catastrophe. Now, a few months on, reviews of “the fulfillment of the dreams of our ancestors,” according to President Nazarbayev, are starting to come in. Here’s what people are saying.

Common Sense and Whiskey, the blog, is companion to EarthPhotos.com, our collection of 20,000+ photos from 120 countries and territories around the world.

My wife and I live on a horse farm in Young Harris, Georgia, and spend parts of every summer in our tiny cabin on Lake Saimaa in Finland. Because my day job has outfitted me with audio equipment, I am available for studio quality broadcast author interviews via SourceConnect.

As to the increased political chatter here lately, I just can't help it.